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| (cover image courtesy chapters-indigo.ca) |
Russell Shorto's Island at the Center of the World isn't about Delphi, location of Omphalos, the earth's belly-button, it's Manhattan -- Dutch New Amsterdam.
Gold medal winner*, Island tells the fascinating story of a multi-ethnic city, under traditional trading post rule by the Dutch East India Company, versus its residents, notably Adriaen van der Donck, student of the Enlightenment, who saw its potential for greatness. When James, Duke of York, brother to Charles II, took the city in a bloodless coup, the Dutch monopoly on world trade commenced its inexorable decline, and England, its rise to empire.
Note
* Winner of the Holland Society's Gold Medal for Literary Excellence and the Washington Irving Prize for Contributions to New York History.
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